Ji-Kun Detailed Strategy Guide (Heroic Mode included)

Table of Contents

• +1. General Information
  • 1.1. Health Values
    • 1.1.1. Ji-Kun and Adds
    • 1.1.2. Eggs
  • 1.2. Enrage Timer
  • 1.3. Raid Composition
• +2. Loot
  • 2.1. Armor
  • 2.2. Weapons
  • 2.3. Cloaks and Trinkets
• 3. DPS Requirements
• 4. Overview of the Fight
• 5. Class-specific Advice
• +6. Abilities
  • 6.1. Ji-Kun
  • 6.2. Nests and Adds
    • 6.2.1. Lower Nests
    • 6.2.2. Upper Nests
    • 6.2.3. Juveniles
    • 6.2.4. Activation Order
    • 6.2.5. Traveling Between Nests
• +7. Strategy
  • 7.1. Handling the Nests
  • 7.2. Ji-Kun's Platform
  • 7.3. Tip for Maximising DPS
• 8. When to Use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp
• 9. Learning the Fight
• +10. Heroic Mode
  • 10.1. Differences From Normal Mode
  • 10.2. Strategy
• 11. Concluding Remarks
• 12. Changelog

Introduction

This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Ji-Kun in Throne of Thunder. It is targeted at anyone who desires to understand the fight mechanics.

This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.1.2.

Ji-Kun is the sixth boss in the Throne of Thunder raid instance. This boss is quite reminiscent of Alysrazor in the Firelands raid. That said, this encounter is less complicated than the one against Alysrazor, and it is generally simple from a strategy point of view.

The fight presents a recurring DPS check for your raid, and there are copious amounts of raid damage to heal.

We currently have no information about the enrage timer. We will update this section when we know more.

The fight against Ji-Kun is a single-phase encounter where you have to face Ji-Kun herself, as well as a few types of adds that sometimes enter the fight.

Ji-Kun is located on a circular platform, where she spends the entire fight and where two tanks will need to alternate tanking her. In addition to this, there exist 5 nests (or roosts as they are called in-game) located below her platform, and 5 located above. On each of the nests below her platform, there are eggs which, at certain points in the fight spawn a number of adds called Hatchlings. If these Hatchlings are not killed within a certain amount of time, they turn into Fledgelings, a similar but more damaging type of adds. In turn, these adds will eventually lay another type of eggs, called Mature Eggs of Ji-Kun, which hatch after a given amount of time, spawning more powerful adds called Juveniles. Your raid members must regularly travel down to these nests to kill the Hatchlings before they have time to lay eggs. The nests above Ji-Kun's platform contain Mature Eggs of Ji-Kun, which activate at certain times. When the eggs on a nest activate, your raid members have a given amount of time to kill them before they turn into Juveniles.

Several of your raid members will have to make regular trips to the nests in order to kill the adds, while the rest of your raid members will remain on Ji-Kun's platform.

We have released a video guide for the fight against Ji-Kun. We strongly recommend watching the video in order to get a better visual idea of the fight.

On our forums, we are maintaining threads with class-specific advice for each of the fights of Throne of Thunder. So, make sure to check them out, and if you have things to share, do not hesitate to contribute!

Class	Forum Threads
Death Knight	Blood Frost/Unholy
Druid	Balance Feral Guardian Restoration
Hunter	All specs
Mage	All specs
Monk	Brewmaster Mistweaver Windwalker
Paladin	Holy Protection Retribution
Priest	Discipline Holy Shadow
Rogue	All specs
Shaman	Elemental Enhancement Restoration
Warlock	All specs
Warrior	Arms/Fury Protection

Ji-Kun uses several abilities, which, for the most part, only affect players on her own platform. We will detail them here before talking about the abilities and mechanics that concern the adds.

• Infected Talons and Talon Rake are stacking tank debuffs that require a tank switch.
  • Infected Talons is a stacking Nature damage DoT.
  • Talon Rake is a powerful attack that also applies a debuff which causes the target to take increased damage from Talon Rake for 1 minute.
• Down Draft is a spell that Ji-Kun casts roughly every 2 minutes. It is a channeled spell that pushes all players away from Ji-Kun for 8 seconds. Players must run towards Ji-Kun to avoid being pushed back.
• Caw is a nuke that Ji-Kun casts often. She sends sound waves at the location of random raid members (2 in 10-man, and 5 in 25-man and LFR), which deal damage in an 8-yard radius of their point of impact.
• Quills is a raid-wide AoE attack that Ji-Kun channels for 8 seconds roughly every one minute. It deals damage to all players on Ji-Kun's platform, as well as to players located on the nests below.

In addition to these abilities, Ji-Kun has one more important spell. She regularly casts Feed Young throughout the fight to feed the Hatchlings in the nests below. When there are no Hatchlings alive, then Ji-Kun will target random locations on her platform. In this case, Feed Young manifests as green balls of slime falling down from the ceiling, leaving a green void zone upon landing. These void zones have several characteristics.

• If a player stands in a void zone for 3 seconds, the void zone disappears.
• Standing in a void zone causes players to become Slimed, taking Nature damage over time and taking increased damage from further applications of Slimed. This debuff persists for the entire duration of the fight.
• If a player who is flying (the ability to fly is gained after killing Hatchlings, as we will see below) intercepts the food thrown by Ji-Kun while it is in the air (it falls to the ground slowly), they prevent the void zone from spawning, and they gain a stack of a 30-second buff called Primal Nutriment, which increases damage and healing done by 30% for the first application, and by an additional 10% for successive applications.

When Feed Young lands at the location of the Hatchlings, they begin to eat for 10 seconds. If the Hatchlings are still alive after this time, they turn into more powerful adds called Fledgelings.

There are 5 nests located below Ji-Kun's platform. On each of them, there are several unattackable and untargetable eggs. When one of these nests is activated, from these eggs appear several Hatchlings (4 in 10-man, and 5 in 25-man). Hatchlings have a single ability, called Cheep, which causes them to deal a small amount of damage to their target.

After they hatch, the Hatchlings call for food, and Ji-Kun's next Feed Young will target them (instead of random locations on her platform). After the food lands, the Hatchlings begin to eat it, channeling for 10 seconds. If the Hatchlings are alive to finish this cast, they turn into Fledgelings, similar adds who deal much higher damage. After a while, the Fledgelings lay eggs of their own, which spawn even more powerful adds called Juveniles. We explain these adds below.

There are 3 nests located above Ji-Kun's platform. On these nests, there exist several Mature Eggs of Ji-Kun. When one of these nests is activated, these eggs begin hatching over 20 seconds. If they are not killed before this happens, Juveniles spawn from the eggs. We talk about the Juveniles below.

Juveniles are the adds that represent the final product of the lower nests, as well as the result of the hatching of eggs on the upper nests.

Juveniles have a lot of health (although they spawn with the same health percentage as the egg from which they hatched had when the hatching took place). They fly above the raid, throwing down balls of slime very similar to those from Feed Young, which also leave behind void zones.

The Juveniles cannot be reached from Ji-Kun's platform by ranged DPS players, and since the void zones that they put down will eventually overwhelm you, these adds must simply be prevented from spawning in the first place.

As soon as the fight starts, the north-eastern lower nest will activate. From this moment on, every 30 seconds until the end of the fight, a new nest activates. So, 30 seconds after the first nest activates, the next lower nest, in a clockwise fashion (the south-eastern nest) will activate, and so on. Sometime, a lower and an upper nest activate at the same time.

The activation orders are different in 10 and 25-man. We will do our best to describe them below, but this is not very important since the newly activated nest is always clearly indicated by a large beam of red light shining on it, and players do not need to get to a nest immediately.

In 10-man, the activation order is as follows.

1. Activations 1-3 activate a lower nest each.
2. Activations 4-6 activate an upper nest each.
3. Activations 7 and 8 activate a lower nest each.
4. Activations 9 and 10 happen at the same time, and they active a lower and an upper nest.
5. Activations 11 and 12 activate and upper nest each.

From this point on, the cycle restarts, but the fight should not last long beyond this point.

In 25-man, it is as we describe below.

1. Activations 1-4 activate a lower nest each.
2. Activations 5 and 6 happen at the same time, and they activate a lower and an upper nest.
3. Activations 7 and 8 activate an upper nest each.
4. Activations 9 and 10 happen at the same time, and they activate a lower and an upper nest.
5. Activations 11 and 12 happen at the same time, and they activate a lower and an upper nest.
6. Activations 13 and 14 activate a lower nest each.
7. Activations 15 and 16 happen at the same time, and they active a lower and an up upper nest.

This carries on in what appears to be a rather random order until the rest of the fight.

It is important to note that players who are located on the nests take damage from Quills, the raid-wide AoE spell that Ji-Kun sometimes casts.

In order to get from Ji-Kun to one of the nests below her platform, one must simply run or jump off of Ji-Kun's platform and onto the nest. Missing the nest does not cause the players to die or get stuck - once they reach the ground, they are thrown back up to the top, although precious time is wasted.

Traveling from one nest to another, from a nest back up to Ji-Kun's platform, and to nests located above her platform, however, is done differently. Each Hatchling leaves behind a feather when it dies. Walking over this feather grants the respective player a buff with 4 charges, called Daedalian Wings. While this buff is active, players have an extra action button with the ability Flight. Using this grants the player the ability to fly for 10 seconds, with a 15-second cooldown. Picking up a feather applies a 1-minute debuff called Lesson of Icarus to the player. While this debuff is active, the player cannot pick up any new feathers.

It is important to note that if your Flight buff ends while you are still flying, you will not take fall damage.

We will begin by summarising the strategy for the fight before going into further details.

• Have your two tanks alternate tanking Ji-Kun in order to manage the Infected Talons and Talon Rake debuffs.
• Assign groups of raid members (3 DPS players and 1 healer in 10-man, and 4 DPS players and 1 healer in 25-man) to go to the nests that activate and handle them accordingly (killing Hatchlings or Mature Eggs of Ji-Kun, respectively). Given the limitations imposed by Lesson of Icarus and the fact that sometimes two nests activate at once, you will need to set up a rotation between these groups.
• Have everyone on Ji-Kun's platform be spread out to minimise damage from Caw.
• Run towards Ji-Kun when she is channeling Down Draft.
• Have players with stacks of Flight to spare intercept as many of the balls of slime that Ji-Kun throws on her platform as possible, in order to prevent the Feed Pools from spawning, and in order to gain as many stacks of Primal Nutriments as possible.
• Have players on Ji-Kun's platform actively despawn Feed Pools regularly by standing inside them for 3 seconds.

You should assign several groups of players to form groups.

You should create two groups of players (1 healer and 3 DPS players in 10-man, and 1 healer and 4 DPS players in 25-man). Have the first group ready to jump down to the first nest at the start of the fight. As soon as they have killed the Hatchlings present there, these players should use their Flight ability to get back up to Ji-Kun's platform, and the second group should prepare to jump down to the second nest.

Either of the two groups can handle the third nest, and then, for the fourth and fifth nests that activate (at the same time, one lower and one upper), each of the groups should take one nest.

Once this set of nests has been handled, players should once again be able to take the Daedalian Wings buff ( Lesson of Icarus should have faded), and the cycle can repeat itself.

Things on Ji-Kun's platform are not complicated.

The two tanks must alternate tanking Ji-Kun in order to manage the debuffs that the boss applies.

Everyone must be spread out in order to minimise the damage dealt by Caw, and everyone should run towards Ji-Kun when she casts Down Draft. Any movement-speed-increasing abilities you can use when Down Draft is being cast will help greatly. Players who have charges of Flight available can essentially bypass Down Draft by flying above it, but this can hardly be done reliably.

Anyone who is close to a Feed Pool void zone and who has enough health to survive its damage should move into it for 3 seconds in order to despawn it.

Healers will need to be prepared for the high raid damage dealt when Ji-Kun casts Quills.

In 25-man, you should assign one group of 4 strong DPS players to jump down to a nest, kill the Hatchlings present there, and fly back up to Ji-Kun's platform. These players should use their remaining 3 charges of Flight to fly up in the air when Ji-Kun casts Feed Young on her platform, and intercept as many balls of slime as they can. This will allow them to stack the Primal Nutriments buff, and greatly boost your raid DPS. In 10-man, this task can be performed sporadically by any raiders who have spare Flight charges.

We recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp towards the end of the fight. Things can tend to get out of control when the fight nears the end, and you may even have a few Juveniles that had time to hatch from an upper nest which will now circle your raid. You can use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp here to kill Ji-Kun faster.

There are several important things your raid members must learn.

First and foremost, several raid members will have to master the task of handling the eggs located on the nests below Ji-Kun's platform, as failing this task will quickly cause a wipe. There is no special way of learning this, and you will simply have to sacrifice a few attempts while these players understand the task.

Secondly, everyone must be prepared to run towards Ji-Kun when she casts Down Draft, as otherwise they risk being thrown off the platform or at the very least pushed on top of Feed Pools.

The remaining tasks are more subtle and will require more practice, and they both have to do with the Feed Pools. Having your raid members intercept Feed Pools before they even spawn, and having them despawn some regularly to keep their numbers in check are things that will make your attempts to kill the boss go a lot more smoothly.

The Heroic mode of Ji-Kun is one of the most accessible Heroic modes in the Throne of Thunder. The fight plays out almost identically to Normal mode, with only one important difference.

In addition to the increased health and damage of all the mobs in the encounter, there is one important difference in Heroic mode. On several nests throughout the fight, in addition to the eggs there becoming active, there is also a Nest Guardian, an add which must be tanked.

The Nest Guardians melee their tank and must be faced away from other raid members. If no one is engaged in combat with a Nest Guardian (for example, if you send no one to the nest), then it will deal high Physical damage to the raid, and interrupt casting, thus leading to a wipe.

In 10-man, Nest Guardians are present in the following activations:

• activation 2 (lower nest);
• activation 4 (upper nest);
• activation 8 (lower nest);
• activation 10 (upper nest);
• activation 12 (upper nest).

In 25-man, the Guardians are present in the following activations:

• activation 2 (lower nest);
• activation 6 (lower nest);
• activation 12 (upper nest);
• activation 17 (upper nest);
• activation 22 (lower nest);
• activation 29 (upper nest).

Another minor difference exists, which is that Daedalian Wings now only has 3 charges, instead of 4 in Normal mode.

Each Nest Guardian will have to be tanked as soon as it spawns, and your DPS players will have to kill it in addition to the adds present on that nest. This means that your tanks will need to alternate tanking Ji-Kun in such a way that they can make it to every Nest Guardian spawn location.

Given the variety of ways in which you can choose to assign players to handling the nests, we feel that this is a task best left up to the raid leader.

It is also worth mentioning that Quills deals a very large amount of damage in Heroic mode, so healers should be prepared for it, and they should not hesitate to use defensive cooldowns.

This concludes our raid guide for Ji-Kun. We hope you have found it helpful. Please do not hesitate to post any feedback you may have on our forums.

• 15 May 2013: Added Heroic mode.
• 24 Mar. 2013: Clarified 10-man nest activation order (based on forum comments); added mention of the fact that the Slimed debuff persists until the end of the fight.
• 21 Mar. 2013: Replaced our PTR preview with our video guide.
• 13 Mar. 2013: Added link to forum threads that contain class-specific advice for the encounter.
• 08 Mar. 2013: Major changes to account for live realm version.
  • Re-designed the explanations of what happens on the lower nests.
  • Added mention that you gain Daedalian Wings by simply running over the feathers dropped by Hatchlings.
  • Added mention that you cannot DPS the Juveniles from Ji-Kun's platform.
  • Removed mentions that claimed that jumping during Down Draft helps.
  • Added mention that you need to be flying to be able to intercept Feed Young.
  • Made several adjustments to the strategy, especially for how to best deal with the nests.

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